Cacao is a tropical crop thriving in equatorial conditions. It produces cacao beans, the main ingredient of many products ranging from food to cosmetics. The best-known and most popular of all products is chocolate made from cacao mass, cacao butter and sugar.

Cacao is a cash crop that can provide a good income. It is a perennial crop with a relatively short gestation period. Demand for cacao is growing and a market is readily available. Cacao can be intercropped with other cash crops, especially coconut trees.

The Philippines is well-positioned to take advantage of increasing demand due to the country’s ideal climactic conditions, abundant supply of coconut lands and smallholder farmers.

For more information, see what the World Cocoa Foundation (http://worldcocoafoundation.org/about-cocoa/) and the International Cocoa Organization (http://www.icco.org/faq) has to say about cacao.

Why-Cacao

Contract Growing Program

KFI has run cacao contract growing programs that encompass the agricultural value chain and involve farmer cooperatives, local government partners, agrarian reform beneficiary organizations and private landowners.

Learn more about contract growing

Corporate-Farm-Program

Corporate Farm Program

KFI is embarking on a corporate farm program to secure its own quality cacao beans. In late 2013, KFI signed an agreement with the University of the Philippines to establish a cacao farm in the UP Mindanao Land Reservation in Marilog, Davao where members of the tribe are employed in the farm.

Learn more about corporate farm

Cacao-Doctor-Program

Cacao Doctor Program

Cacao Doctors run their own for-profit agri-enterprise and provide ongoing coaching and support services to the farmers in their cluster as a business.

Learn more about cacao doctors